End Game

In A Bid For Ratings Resurrection, Nbc Puts Its Faith In The End-of-days Drama Revelations.

April 13, 2005|By Scott Collins Los Angeles Times

When it comes to high dramatic stakes, it's tough to beat the plot of NBC's upcoming drama Revelations.

Inspired by the New Testament's Book of Revelation, the show is about a Harvard professor, played by Bill Pullman, who teams with a nun to try to stop what they believe is the beginning of Armageddon. That's not a premise commonly tackled on The West Wing or ER, but NBC executives are praying that Revelations, which will run for six episodes starting tonight, can connect with the same audience that turned Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code and Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins' apocalyptic "Left Behind" series into best sellers, and Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ into a box-office smash.

Why is NBC -- historically a network focused on snagging affluent young professionals in big cities, often with randy comedies such as Friends and Will & Grace -- getting religion? Simply put, it needs a programming miracle. The network's ratings have fallen 14 percent this season -- more than any competitor -- among the young adults whom advertisers pay premium rates to reach.

Ranked No. 1 among young adults last season, NBC is trailing in fourth place now. That could have a big effect on the network's bottom line later this spring, when it starts selling advance advertising spots for the 2005-06 season.

But NBC is taking a big risk by bringing explicit and often controversial biblical themes into prime time, when past hits in the genre -- such as Highway to Heaven, Touched By an Angel and 7th Heaven -- remained upbeat and ecumenical. The fear of offending some viewers has made networks leery of approaching religious subjects, except for tradition-minded biblical epics, such as CBS's high-rated Jesus miniseries in 2000.

Highway to Heaven, which ran on NBC from 1984 to '89, starred the late Michael Landon as an angel who returned to Earth to help people in trouble, but the series took pains to keep its spirituality broad-based and uplifting. And even shows with general spiritual themes are hardly a sure thing: witness CBS's Joan of Arcadia, about a girl who talks with God; the show's ratings have plummeted 20 percent in its second season.

Revelations approach to religion is much more specific -- and therefore dicier. That may help explain why NBC executives aren't exactly thumping Bibles in their marketing of the show. For instance, the first episode includes an intense scene in which a hospitalized girl speaks in tongues, traditionally a touchstone for charismatic Christians.

"Ultimately, this is a fictional thriller," NBC Entertainment President Kevin Reilly explained in an interview. He made it clear that he welcomed the comparison to The Da Vinci Code.

Although the network, borrowing a page from The Passion's guerrilla marketing campaign, is screening the first episode to build word of mouth, the outreach isn't aimed at the evangelical Christians and other red-state churchgoers one might expect.

NBC screened the first episode of the series for about 3,000 people in nine cities, paying special attention to "students attending major universities and colleges who are studying philosophy, political science, religion, film and television," according to a news release. Reilly says the series is for everyone, not just observant Christians: "If we target to specific groups, we're crossing over [to become] something we don't want to be."

As it happens, the writer of Revelations has irked churchgoers before with his flamboyant interpretations of biblical prophecy. David Seltzer wrote The Omen, the 1976 film about a couple who unwittingly adopt the spawn of Satan; the plot, not to mention the thriller's allusions to the Bible and its often-gory visuals (including graphic hanging and decapitation scenes) made The Omen the subject of intense debate in religious circles.

"I am no scholar, but I am a fascinated student" of Revelation and apocalyptic religion, said Seltzer.

Seltzer began mapping out Revelations after receiving a phone call from veteran producer Gavin Polone (Curb Your Enthusiasm), whose company Pariah is producing the program. Polone had a vague idea for a series about Armageddon, and Seltzer was intrigued.

"I think it's clear the world is on a bubble," the writer said, referring to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Mideast conflict and ecological disasters. "Particularly as you look at the news of the day, I think we see there is such a thing possible as the end of days."

Seltzer sees the age-old conflict between faith and doubt as driving the show, although he added: "It's an entertainment, for sure."

The Book of Revelation's grim end-of-the-world prophecies are coursing through pop culture largely thanks to the LaHaye-Jenkins books, and NBC is hardly the first to invoke the Bible on behalf of a popcorn thriller.